


To Be Chosen

by sugarplumsenpai



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Canon Compliant, M/M, canonverse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-30
Updated: 2017-03-30
Packaged: 2018-10-13 02:02:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,441
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10504146
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sugarplumsenpai/pseuds/sugarplumsenpai
Summary: “What do you want?”In an answer Eren reached for Levi’s hand to lace their fingers and looked straight into grey, stern eyes over still faintly flushed cheeks and swollen lips.[Written for Ereri Canonverse Weekend 2017 | Day 1: Budding Romance]





	

There’s a particular way Levi’s hair is falling into his face sometimes that Eren finds utterly endearing. It’s like a black curtain shutting down to disguise what’s going on behind its drapes, only enhanced by how Levi would tilt his head to his side and evade Eren’s eyes. 

Eren knows it’s mostly to hide a quiet smile. Levi would frown, barely noticeably press his lips together, and gaze at a spot behind Eren’s shoulder, defiantly refusing to look down and appear weak. Sometimes he’d even change the topic. 

Eren gets it. 

It’s not easy to plunge into a relationship that caught you off guard and somehow pulled you in before you had the time to fully understand how it even happened, not easy to accept that someone could choose you, just the way you are, with all your faults and scars and oddities. It doesn’t come effortless to let go and let yourself be vulnerable when you’re used to going through life and loss with walls built around you.

But somehow it had happened. They’d come home from training in the woods one day, stabled their horses, and gone through the drills once more, talking until everyone else had already long been finished and gone. Eren had said something that had made Levi smirk and he’d retorted something that had made Eren laugh in return. The setting sun had sent a patch of enticing light onto a spot on Levi’s neck and the next thing Eren knew, they were kissing in a frenzy and sucking each other off right then and there. It was breathless and messy and rough, hot, wet mouths and trembling hands and more right closer faster need you need you so much now please, and Levi had looked absolutely gorgeous in the golden afternoon glow—all pale and desirable and delicious—making Eren wonder why it had taken them so long to come to this, to finally accept what had been simmering underneath. 

Afterwards Levi had looked at him and asked: “What do you want?” 

Eren still could taste him, still could feel the spots on his hip bones were Levi’s fingernails had greedily digged into his skin and that, to his utter regret, were already about to heal. Their proximity was a part of himself now, had already been for a while if he’s honest, and in an answer he had only reached for Levi’s hand to lace their fingers and looked straight into grey, stern eyes over still faintly flushed cheeks and swollen lips. 

The responsive frown on Levi’s brow had Eren’s heart ache but when Levi spoke again his voice was slightly raw and his thumb brushed over Eren’s. “Are you sure about this?”

“Yes.” He’d firmly squeezed the warm hand in his in affirmation, not willing to let go just yet. 

“I’m old.”

“I’m young.”

A raised eyebrow.

“I thought we were stating facts,” Eren had said with a small smile and shrugged. “I don’t care as long as you don’t.”

Levi had nodded and his hair had fallen over his eyes like this for the first time.

As it does now. 

“Why.” The worried eyes behind a black veil don’t quite meet his own and there’s that familiar crinkle of eyebrows that begs to be eased out with gentle fingertips. But Eren knows that if he tried right now Levi would back away. He still does that sometimes when Eren comes too close, instinctively would take a step back with a hint of panic in his eyes at the intimacy, just as Eren sometimes does as well. So instead of giving in to his urge to touch he fastens his fingers around the china of his cup of Earl Grey, hoping its flavour would supply him with a reply.

They’ve already been through that question a couple of times since that day in the stables but it’s never been asked out loud. It’s been there in secret glances and gestures and in a certain desperation for each other that seems to overcome them from time to time. Something must be different today for Levi to ask out loud. 

Maybe it’s the morning tea that Eren has gotten up for so Levi could stay in bed for just a minute longer. Maybe it’s the night they’ve been having, legs easily tangled and hands searching for each other in their sleep or the fullness of his own heart that Eren hadn’t wanted to disguise when he’d woken up. 

Or, Eren thinks, maybe it’s simply the solemn, white morning light filtering into their kitchen today, making the room look snug and safe and separate from the rest of the world as if they are the only two people alive.

Whatever it is, the question is out in the open now. And by the decisively careless way it has been asked, Eren can tell that the thing between them is as astonishing to Levi as it is to him. Just as wondrous. 

Fact is, as much as he doesn’t know why someone would single out him, when it comes to Levi Eren has a lot of answers to that simple question. However, how to answer it exactly, he has no clue. 

There are the obvious reasons, of course, and he goes through them in his search for the right one. Because you’re also my friend and my rock. Because you’re strong and reliable and honest. Because you’re beautiful to me in a way that isn’t handsome, but so much, much more. Because you’re fascinating, never boring, always surprising. Because you’re gentle and kind, even though you don’t always like to show it. Because your eyes smile at me in that way they do when you think I’m not looking. 

And then there are more complicated reasons. Because of the way you move. Because of how your jaw makes that line there and because of how your fingers bend around your cup of tea and your eyes lighten up at the very first sip. Because of how you glare at dust with that twitch of your lips. Because of the way your hair tickles my nose when we go to sleep and your ice cold feet always seek mine for warmth while you melt against my chest, even though you always complain about how hot I am. Because you’re with me wherever I go. Because you make me mad with your never-waving rationality and selflessness. Because my throat goes tight with tenderness every time I look at you. Think of you. Feel you. Hear you. Smell your scent.

Because it’s a perfect fit. Because you make me feel strong in return and…deserving. 

Words like these don’t come easy to him though and Levi wouldn’t want to hear them anyway. They’re too sweet for a man like him, too soft and fair. And what are words anyway? They only declare things and do more harm than good in Eren’s experience. 

But he has to say something because the silence is stretching and there’s a growing tension in Levi’s shoulders that reminds Eren of a timid stray cat and because Levi has begun to tap his finger against his cup. 

“Because we’re both broken,” Eren says eventually, partly because the words are more a challenge than a confession and partly because they are nothing but the truth. 

For a brief moment the frown eases and then it’s back again and since it appears to be alright now, he reaches out over their tiny kitchen table to brush the hair out of Levi’s eyes and trace one sharp, fine eyebrow, a cheekbone, and then that curve of Levi’s jaw. 

He knows Levi isn’t fragile. Everything about him from his sharp features all the way to his small, steely body tells otherwise. But Eren just can’t help being gentle to this man whenever he’s allowed to. Not when his gaze softens under his touch like it does and the responsive kiss onto his inner wrist is grateful and reassuring and almost haunting.

Levi doesn’t pull back and allows himself to show a short flicker of a smile into his tea when Eren retrieves his hand, thoroughly besotted. 

Yes, he knows Levi loves him just as he does in return, even though neither of them has ever said the actual words out loud. Again, they’re only words…They don’t really need them to know, because they’re already all there. 

And some day, Eren hopes as he smiles back over his own cup of tea, they both will also be able believe what they have been knowing all along. 

It might take them a while. But he’s more than alright with that.

**Author's Note:**

> Feedback is loved. <3


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